Part of Me is Made of Glass, and also, I Love You
by chekcough
Summary: "What happened?" The doctor asks Scully, almost accusatorially. You were supposed to let her die. Scully deflates, feeling as if she could cry. She would, if she knew the reason behind the tears. Sorrow that the child continues to suffer, or relief that her condition has seemed to change?


Chapter One

This is that moment, Scully thinks, where the world stops. It is not a missed heartbeat as you glance across the room and look into the eyes of the one you love. It is not cold fear, terror that petrifies you. No, those would be easier. This, now, is a paused world. She is paralyzed -immobile in an uncomfortable hospital bed while life must be continuing on around them. Now Scully has returned to the cradle of death, not having left it herself so very long ago. The space between her eyes no longer pains her. Now she feels it press against her chest, feels it in every inhale and exhale as her heart beats and her daughter's heart flutters and slows, an uneven melody she can read on a monitor. The world is still, Scully thinks, and it will move again when her daughter's tiny life flows out of it. For now all is frozen, and Scully can only lay beside Emily and wait until the inevitable.

It comforts her to know that Mulder is somewhere outside of this morbid bubble. He is waiting for her to come out, to tell him that it's over. It comforts her to know that he is maybe in a chair just outside the room, his head in his hands. She had sent him away, but he has stayed. She knows this, and suddenly wishes he would disregard her request and come back into the room, break apart the cobwebs and join her in this miserable stagnant pond.

Emily makes a small noise in her drug induced slumber, a little whimper. The little girl's heart skips a beat. Scully puts her hand over Emily's chest and sweeps across it in a comforting motion. The physician in her wishes that Emily would go soon, peacefully. But the mother in her, the one yearning to love and cherish what is left of this small life, is hoping against all hope that she will awaken to find the little girl well again. She can't help it.

It is odd that she can fall asleep here like this. Her daughter is dying in her arms, and yet Scully falls asleep, the baby's clammy forehead against hers. Her chubby hand in her own cool one.

* * *

Something is hot and wet. Someone is crying. There is a putrid smell. Scully awakes to see Emily leaning over into her, vomiting over Scully's chest.

It takes her a moment to realize what is happening. "Oh, my God. Nurse!" She rouses her stiff body, tumbles ungracefully out of the bed. She feels the vomit seeping down her chest and leans out the door, calling for help. Emily is sobbing. The distressed sobs of a sick child who cannot say what exactly is wrong, who wants to be comforted.

"Can I get some help in here?!" Scully shouts to no one in particular, until a nurse takes in her appearance and goes to the room, flipping on the light switch. Emily is vomiting again, and her red cheeks tell of a raging fever. Scully smoothes the hair back from her flaming face.

"Sweetie? Try and calm down, okay?" Emily heaves again, looking terrified and agonized all at once. "You've got to get her more fluids!" Scully says to an uncertain nurse. What did one do for a dying child? The nurse flees, and Scully takes the plastic cup of water from next to the bed, dousing Emily's head and mouth. Refilling it and brushing water across her cheeks. Emily sits through it, hyperventilating and pulling at her soaked gown.

Suddenly, Mulder is there. Scully feels an insistent hand on her back. "What can I do?" She looks up at him. He looks destroyed -his hair ruffled like The Little Prince, his tie half undone, his sleeves rolled up. "We've got to get her out of this bed," Scully says, already removing Emily's too-big hospital gown while Mulder yells at someone in the hall for a clean one. Scully wipes vomit from Emily's face, keeps bathing her face.

"Here," Mulder says, draping and tying the gown in one quick motion over the little girl's tiny body. She is shivering now, although her sobs have subsided.

"Emily?" Scully says, as the doctors and nurses come back in the room. Emily's glazed eyes open wider and take in Scully. She cries again. Scully wraps her in a clean sheet Mulder had brought and pours her into Mulder's arms. He sits down, holding the little body as new bags of fluids are connected to the butterfly IV in the crook of her elbow.

"What happened?" The doctor asks Scully, almost accusatorially. _You were supposed to let her die._ Scully deflates, feeling as if she could cry. She would, if she knew the reason behind the tears. Sorrow that the child continues to suffer, or relief that her condition has seemed to change?

"She woke up," Scully says. "She woke up, vomiting. Her temperature must have risen."

"Any seizures?"

"Not that I know of." She cranes her neck as she hears Emily make small whimpering noises. Mulder meets her gaze, gives her a little nod, and this time Scully feels tears prick. "Excuse me," she whispers, and turns away from the doctor. She has said all that needs to be said.

She finds the nearest washroom and throws water onto her face, onto her blouse. Her lips are trembling. Her daughter may live.

* * *

Scully comes back to the room wearing light blue scrubs, her hair pulled back, her face scrubbed bare. The room is empty, and for a horrible instant Scully believes that Emily has really died, that they have already taken her to the morgue. Where is Mulder? She had trusted him to hold her in his arms.

"Miss Scully?" a nurse wearing a Winnie the Pooh scrub top is waving to her from across the hall. They have moved her to a clean room, to a clean bed.

"How is she?" Scully asks, crossing quickly to the room.

"Her fever's broken," the nurse says, squeezing Scully's arm. Incredible.

Scully ducks her head into the room timidly, like a skittish cat. Emily is laying in bed with Mulder sitting next to her, a chair pulled up right beside her. The little girl is smiling softly at whatever he's saying. It is surreal, this. Now the world is alive and moving, and it is almost overwhelming. The steady beat of Emily's heart, the way her little feet move to find a more comfortable position under the white blanket.

"Hey, Scully," Mulder says, looking up, and Emily's gaze follows his. Scully wonders what he thinks of her sudden flee in the midst of chaos, but his expression reveals nothing. Emily looks at her curiously.

"Hi," Scully says, stepping cautiously into the room, going around the bed to sit on the edge of it near to where Mulder's crossed arms are resting. "Are you feeling better, Emily?"

Emily nods slowly, and Scully's heart fills to bursting when she looks down to see the little girl holding onto a few of Mulder's long fingers. "I'm sleepy."

Scully puts a hand over Emily's blanketed foot awkwardly. "You should go to sleep then, sweetie. We'll be right here when you wake up."

Emily looks at her with Scully's big, blue eyes. "I want to be in my bed. At home."

Scully nods. "I know you do, Emily. But tonight you have to stay in this bed, so we can take care of you." Emily looks to Mulder, now.

"Can I go back home soon? Mommy said no more tests."

"There won't be any more tests, Emily," Scully offers, and Emily moves her little foot out from under Scully's hand. She closes her eyes and turns away from them. This seems to be their cue, and Mulder looks up at Scully expectantly. It appears that she is in charge here.

"You want something to eat?" Mulder asks, standing and stretching, tucking the blanket up over Emily's curled body. Scully shakes her head.

"I don't think I could eat right now. Besides, I want one of us to stay with her."

Mulder nods, and under his moment of scrutiny Scully relaxes her shoulders. "Maybe an orange juice. I could stand some orange juice."

This seems to brighten him up. He touches her arm fleetingly and leaves her to sit in the chair again, eyes watery and weary, staring at the miracle that was never meant to be. At the miracle that this child is, now. To rise from the almost dead. How like her mother.

* * *

**A/N: I wrote this awhile ago, but I'm publishing it now, without a lot of edits. It's not quite what I want it to be, but it's okay for a start. I have a bit more to add to this, so look out for that! **


End file.
